


The Rabbit in the Snow

by rosensilence



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: A Wizard Did It, AU, I promise that the only romance is between humans, M/M, Modern AU, Rabbits, Slow Burn, it's the starkiller base rescue but with a rabbit, kylo is the cutest rabbit, past hux/mitaka, phasma is the best vet, rey is small but mighty, this is the softest thing i've ever written
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 08:03:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14256561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosensilence/pseuds/rosensilence
Summary: Hux's life consists of his job in a toy store and avoiding other people as much as possible.  When he finds a rabbit bleeding in the snow, he takes it home and nurses it back to health.  He soon finds out that this is no ordinary rabbit, and his life gets turned upside down along the way.





	The Rabbit in the Snow

**Author's Note:**

> The song title comes from the Belle and Sebastian song 'The Fox in the Snow.'

Armitage Hux was having a very bad day.

It had all started when he’d opened the curtains in his living room that morning to see the world outside covered in a thick blanket of unseasonable snow.  It had continued when his car had refused to start, and become even worse when he’d had to trudge the fifteen minute walk to his nearest Underground station, only to find out that half of London had also decided to take the train.

By the time his train had arrived, he had already been on the cusp of being late for work.  An uncomfortable, wet and sweaty ride in the tin can that was an Underground train whilst pressed against an equally sweaty businessman and his pointy briefcase had done nothing to improve Hux’s mood.

Hux had arrived at work ten minutes late to find that he was the only one who had managed to get to work at all.  A little bit of snow, and the entire city ground to a halt. Hux had opened the toy store alone, and had resigned himself to a busy day divided between serving the customers that had braved the weather, and mopping away the snow and slush they’d walk onto his usually pristine floor.

By the time 5pm had rolled around and Hux had been able to shut the store, all he could think about was what a colossal waste of time the day had been.  He had sold nothing, and the hems of his expensive pure wool trousers were encrusted with graying snow. His shoes were going to take hours of buffing to get their just purchased shine back.

His journey home had been as uncomfortable as the journey to work, only it was worse because all of the trains were so busy that he had to wait thirty minutes before a train arrived that he could slip his slim yet tall frame onto.  His only solace on that journey home had been that it was the end of the day, and there was a hot bath and an evening with Netflix waiting for him.

Hux kept his head down as he walked from the train station to his flat, his eyes trained on the snow for the places that looked less deep, and less likely to be icy.  Although, slipping and falling on his arse would be the perfect end to his day, he thought.

It was while looking for a safe path to walk that he saw the drops of blood.  It wasn’t much blood, maybe no more than a couple of thimbles worth, but it painted a trail into some bushes that lined the side of the road.  It seemed too little blood to be human, and no human could have crawled into those bushes either, as they were too low to the ground and tightly packed for anything human sized.

That meant it had to be an animal.

As a child, Hux hadn’t had much time for his peers.  His father had raised him to be ruthless and to believe that friendship was weakness.  The military boarding school he’d been shipped off to at 12 years old had only reinforced his father’s indoctrination, and the teenage Hux had led a very solitary life of constantly looking over his shoulder to see where the next knife was coming from.  

But this lack of compassion that had been carefully cultivated in him had never been able to spread to animals.  Since he’d been old enough to wander the grounds of his family home alone, he’d been rescuing damaged animals and bringing them back to full health.  Even at the military school, where such compassion would have been seen as a weakness that needed beating out of him, he’d found a corner in an isolated and unused storeroom that he’d turned into a mini animal hospital.

He’d treated everything there - from common sparrows to the occasional fox that wandered onto the grounds.  He’d made splints out of lollipop sticks, bandages from a fraying sheet he’d managed to find, and had hidden scraps of food in the pockets of his trousers, all to heal his animal charges.  The adult Hux had little time for most adults and roughly half of the children he dealt with daily, but his heart was always open for animals.

Maybe that was why his best, and only, friend was a veterinarian.

After deciding that his trousers were already enough of a write off for that day, he dropped to his knees, cursing under his breath as the wet snow soaked through to his skin, and took a look under the bush.

It was an animal.  Hux couldn’t tell exactly what it was at first glance due to the darkness of the evening and the shadows underneath the bush, but it was definitely something fluffy, and something that appeared to be in some pain.  He pulled his phone out of his jacket pocket and used the torch function to give him some light.

It was a rabbit.  A big, fluffy black rabbit that was staring at him with wide eyes.  Hux muttered under his breath in what he hoped was a soothing tone as he reached in further, his fingers coming into contact with soft fur.  He took it slowly as he knew from experience that an injured animal would act out if it felt scared, but he was able to get a hand around the rabbit’s body.  It didn’t react to Hux’s actions, it just seemed to be staring at him.

Hux was able to coax the rabbit out from underneath the bushes, and could immediately see the injury.  There was a gash running from the top of the rabbit’s head, past its right eye, and down to its body. It wasn’t a serious injury, Hux could tell, but it ran the risk of becoming infected if it wasn’t treated swiftly.  And no animal, injured or otherwise, should be spending a lonely night outside in the snow, Hux thought.

He was only a few hundred yards from his house, so Hux shook off his Burberry coat and wrapped the rabbit inside it, careful to not aggravate the rabbit’s head injury, or get blood on the expensive jacket.  He cradled the rabbit against his chest as he carried it, and in such close contact he could feel how the animal was shaking. It was in shock, he thought, and he knew that shock could easily be a killer in a small animal like a rabbit.  He held it tighter as his flat came into view.

He lived on the ground floor of a small building that contained eight self contained flats, four on the ground floor and four on the first, and he ignored the pile of junk mail that littered his welcome mat as he opened the door and walked inside.  He didn’t have any boxes that were big enough to contain a slightly larger than average rabbit, so he juggled the rabbit into one arm while he used the other to pull out the bottom drawer of his wardrobe. He grabbed some clean towels, lined the drawer with it, and gently placed the still shaking rabbit inside before carrying everything to the living room and ensuring that the central heating was switched as high as it would go.

“You’re okay,” he said to the rabbit as he placed another towel on top of its still shaking body, “I’ll look after you.”

The rabbit’s shakes seemed to subside a little at Hux’s words, almost as if it had understood what Hux had said, but Hux knew that it was more likely due to the rabbit beginning to feel safe and warm.  He patted the rabbit on the head with his index finger, taking care to stay away from the injury, and opened the contacts on his phone. 

He hoped that Dr. Phasma was both at home, and willing to make a house call.

Luckily for Hux, she picked up the phone on the second ring, and after hearing about his injured charge she agreed to come around immediately.  Sensing that the rabbit was in no immediate danger, Hux took the chance to change out of his wet clothes and into a more comfortable combination of sweatpants and an oversized hooded top.  It was far more casual than he’d usually let anyone see, but Phasma wasn’t just anyone.

Hux had met Phasma at university.  She had been studying veterinarianism, and he had been studying business.  Their chosen subjects of study had had little in common, and at first glance neither had their personalities, but for some reason they had connected instantly and been a major part of each other’s lives since.  Phasma was the kind of person you could rely on, Hux knew. If you needed a lift home at 3am, a wingman in a bar, or someone to give a brutally honest opinion, than Phasma was the perfect choice.

The rabbit had seemingly not moved in the ten minutes that Hux had been away changing, and it wasn’t much longer before the doorbell rang to announce that Phasma had arrived.

“That’ll be Phasma,” Hux told the rabbit.  “You’ll like her, she’ll get you fixed up and bouncing around again in no time.”

The rabbit didn’t answer.

Phasma was able to fill a room, no matter how large, through sheer force of personality and it appeared that not even being called out on a cold and snowy Thursday evening was enough to dampen her spirits.  She came floating into Hux’s living room, veterinarian bag in hand, and wrapped him up into a bone crushing hug. There may have been a time when Hux would have been embarrassed to be manhandled by a woman as easily as Phasma could handle him, but that time had passed as soon as he had crawled out from underneath his father’s oppressive grasp.  Now, he took solace in Phasma’s hugs, even if he did sometimes feel like his ribs would crack.

“Where’s the patient?” Phasma asked, her blue eyes scanning the obsessive neatness of Hux’s living room.

“It’s here.”  Hux led Phasma to the makeshift box and hovered nervously as Phasma dropped to her knees to take a look.

“What a beautiful specimen,” she said, leaning in take a better look.  “Glossy fur, a good weight, bright eyes, despite the injury…. I’d guess that this is a family pet that lost an argument with a cat.”

The rabbit squirmed and became agitated as Phasma spoke, it’s body twisting in the towels it was wrapped in until they came loose, it’s head shaking from side to side.  It was the most movement Hux had seen from the rabbit since he’d picked it up, and it made Hux nervous.

“It’s okay,” he said, leaning down to stroke his fingers along the rabbit’s side in an attempt to soothe it.  “She’s here to help.”

The rabbit calmed down, but still seemed skittish.  Phasma was astute enough to realise that Hux seemed to have some sort of soothing effect on the rabbit, so she was quick to ask for his help.  “Can you roll the rabbit onto his back and keep a hold of his body for me?”

Hux did as he was asked, his right hand becoming lost in the black fur that covered the rabbit’s belly.  From this angle, with the rabbit stretched out on its back, it was easier to see just how large it was. As Phasma worked on cleaning the injury, Hux wondered if it was in fact a hare, instead of just an overfed pet.  It didn’t take long to clean the head injury, and the rabbit barely moved while Phasma worked. Hux felt like the rabbit was staring at him throughout the entire process, but quickly wrote that off as paranoia. 

“Right,” Phasma said, packing away her medical supplies, “let me just check one last thing and we’ll be all finished.”  She quickly checked between the rabbit’s hind legs before looking at Hux with a smile. “Hasn’t he been a good boy?”

That answered that question, Hux thought.  He didn’t need to refer to the rabbit as “it” anymore.  Hux gave the rabbit one last pat on the stomach before letting go, watching with amusement as the rabbit scrambled onto all fours with a distinct lack of coordination.  “Now what?” he asked Phasma.

She took off her medical gloves and nonchalantly shoved them into her pockets.  “I’ll put some posters up in my surgery and spread the word to the other vets and animal rescue centres in the area.  He’s not chipped, but I’m sure we’ll get him reunited with his family soon enough.”

“Shall I keep him until then?” Hux asked.

He knew it was a bad idea, but he’d already begun to grow attached to the rabbit.  It had looked so sad and damaged when he’d found it in the snow earlier, and there was something about seeing an animal react to you in a positive way that always made Hux’s heart swell.  Animals were far more agreeable than humans, he thought.

“If you could, that’d be a great help.  My surgery is pretty full right now so although I could take him, you’d be doing me a favor by keeping him.”  Phasma smiled. “Besides, he seems to like you.”

Hux returned the smile.  “He does, doesn’t he?”

“I guessed you wouldn’t be prepared to look after a rabbit, so I stopped by the surgery on the way here and picked up some food.”  She picked up a plastic bag and passed it over to Hux. “There’s some hay and rabbit pellets in there. Vegetables are fine of course, and the occasional bit of fruit is okay as a treat.  Make sure he has plenty of water to drink too.”

“I’ll take good care of him.”

Phasma smiled.  “I know you will.  I don’t know why you chose to work with children everyday instead of animals.  You’re far better with animals than those brats that run around your store.”

“They’re not brats, Phasma,” Hux said with a smirk, “they’re valued customers.”

Phasma took one last look around Hux’s living room to make sure that she hadn’t left anything behind before getting ready to leave.  “Right, keep telling yourself that. If you have any problems or questions about the rabbit, just give me a call.”

“Will do,” Hux said as he rushed to open the door for her, “thanks again for coming out on such a bad night.”

Phasma stepped outside, her high heels sinking into the snow that had accumulated on Hux’s front doorstep.  He knew he should clear that before it had chance to ice over. “You owe me a drink.”

“Maybe this weekend?” Hux asked.  His social calendar may have been as quiet as a graveyard, but he knew better than to presume that Phasma’s was the same.

“I have plans already,” she said apologetically.  “Maybe next week sometime.”

Hux nodded his agreement and then Phasma was gone, striding down the pavement in her heels as if the concrete wasn’t covered in snow and ice.  He continued watching until she was out of sight despite the cold evening air that cut through his thin clothing. When she was gone, he shut the door and headed back into the living room to check on his temporary charge.

The rabbit was where he had left him, still sitting peacefully on all fours with his eyes just about able to peak over the edge of the drawer.  He was a peculiar rabbit, Hux thought. He had dealt with injured rabbits before, but he didn’t remember any of the other rabbits ever watching him with such calm and scrutiny before.  

“Right, just us again then,” Hux announced to the rabbit.  “Let’s get you some dinner, shall we?”

Hux went to his small but functional kitchen and searched through his meticulously ordered, but barely used, tableware to find a saucer and a small dish.  Onto the saucer he placed some of the rabbit pellets that Phasma had brought him, and the dish was filled with water from his Brita filter. He made a little space for them in the drawer as the rabbit merely watched, his nose twitching at the sight and smell of the pellets.

Hux scratched the back of the rabbit’s neck.  “You’ve had a stressful day, Rabbit. If you’re hungry have something to eat, and then straight to bed.”

For the briefest of moments Hux felt self conscious about speaking to the rabbit as if he was a small child that Hux was looking after, but after the rabbit snuggled into one of the towels in his drawer and promptly fell asleep, the self consciousness passed.  There was nobody there to hear how Hux was talking to the rabbit after all, and after the bad day both the rabbit and Hux had had, a few soft words were welcomed.

The rest of Hux’s evening was uneventful.  He ate dinner in front of the TV, cleared his doorstep of snow, and relaxed in a nice hot bath until his skin turned lobster red and wrinkled like a prune.  He constantly checked the status of the rabbit, but it didn’t stir once, and seemed content to sleep the night away. Hux had an equally peaceful night full of pleasant dreams of a dark haired stranger that he couldn’t remember in the morning.

***

The rabbit was still asleep when Hux left for the work the next morning, so he was unsurprised to see that neither the pellets nor the water had been touched.  He replaced the water with fresh water, and made sure that the rabbit’s wound hadn’t been aggravated in the night before leaving.

Most of the snow had melted overnight so Hux’s day at the toy store was much busier than the day before.  He found that he barely had time to think about the rabbit, especially as in-between serving customers he was trying to complete the paperwork the store’s owner could never remember to do.  Although Hux was the store manager, it wasn’t his responsibility to balance the books. He did so because it made use of his degree, and because he cared enough about his job to not want the store owner, an old, set in his ways guy by the name of Peavey, to get everything wrong and set the taxman on them.

The main benefit of busy days was that they flew by quickly, and soon enough it was time for the store to close and Hux to go home.  Hux found that he was looking forward to going home for reasons more than just escaping work, or being able to relax in his robe with his feet up and a cup of tea in hand.  He was eager to see how the rabbit was doing, and also to see if it had managed to destroy any part of his house. He had left the rabbit’s drawer in the kitchen before leaving, and thankfully there wasn’t much in there that even a rabbit the size of that one could destroy.

At least he hoped there wasn’t.

When Hux got home, he removed his shoes and left them lined up neatly next to his front door before slowly and carefully opening the kitchen door.  He had half anticipated to see a streak of black fur come flying out of the kitchen, but he needn’t have worried. The rabbit was sat in the middle of the drawer, half covered by a blanket, and did nothing but watch as Hux walked in.

“Hello, Rabbit,” Hux said cheerfully.  He wasn’t usually a cheerful man. Even his demeanor with his customers was more polite and professional than cheerful, but there was something about an injured animal recovering that had always made him smile.  “How was your day? Mine was pretty bad, if I’m perfectly honest.”

The rabbit cocked his head and seemed to gesture towards the food and water bowls that Hux had set out for him.  The water dish was empty, but the saucer was still full of the rabbit pellets. It appeared that the rabbit hadn’t eaten at all.

Hux crouched down and picked up a pellet.  He gave it a quick sniff and had to admit that it didn’t seem particularly appetizing, but then again he wasn’t a rabbit.  He reached out to the rabbit, pellet in hand, and offered it directly. “Come on, you must be hungry by now.”

The rabbit looked at the pellet, looked at Hux’s face, and then turned his back.

“You don’t like them, huh?  Well, I don’t blame you, they do smell pretty bad.  Okay, let’s try something else.”

Hux picked up the saucer full of pellets and threw them in the bin.  The bag that Phasma had given him the night before was on the counter, and after throwing away the rest of the pellets, he grabbed a handful of the hay that was also in there.  He sat down on the floor next to the rabbit, and offered some of the hay.

The rabbit sniffed the hay, and then took a couple of steps back without eating any.  Hux knew that it was pointless to try and put human emotions onto the expressions of animals, but he still couldn’t help but feel that the rabbit was side eyeing him.

“No hay either?  You’re one picky rabbit, Rabbit.  You need to eat though if your face is going to heal.”

Hux stood up again and opened his fridge.  Cooking was one thing that Hux enjoyed doing, although he was usually too tired and dead inside after a day at the toy store to devote enough time to it.  When he had the time though, he loved to create whatever took his fancy and because of this, his fridge was always well stocked with the raw ingredients needed to create healthy, hearty meals.

He pulled out the vegetable drawer at the bottom of the fridge, and showed it to the rabbit.  Immediately, the rabbit’s ears perked up and he rose onto his hind legs. 

Hux sighed.  “Of course you want the vegetables.  These are from the food hall at Harrods and are the best carrots in London,” he explained, waving a carrot at the rabbit.  

He prepared a plate full of various vegetables and couldn’t help but smile when the rabbit’s nose twitched as he placed it in the drawer.  “Now make sure you eat them all.” 

Hux had barely let go of the plate before the rabbit had dived in, munching his way through everything with no grace or seemingly time to take a breath.  Hux watched him for a few moments and found the stress of the day melting away before beginning to prepare his own dinner.

He usually ate in the living room in front of the TV, so he took the rabbit with him.  The rabbit seemed content to be picked up so Hux did so, leaving the drawer behind and placing the rabbit on the couch next to him.  He was just about to find out who had murdered the postman in the latest episode of the nation’s favourite soap opera, when the channel changed.

Sometimes the TV remote acted strangely if the batteries were running out so he turned to pick it up and give it a shake, only to find that rabbit’s front paw was hovering over the channel change button.

“This is for humans to play with, not rabbits,” he said, changing the channel back to the soap opera.

Two seconds later, the channel changed again.  And again. It was the rabbit, flicking through the TV channels.  The rabbit flicked past a football game and a quiz show, lingered slightly on a news report about the son of an American senator that had gone missing in London, but then continued channel surfing until stopping on one of the movie channels Hux paid for but always meant to cancel.  The rabbit’s ears perked up, and he stared at the screen.

Hux laughed to himself.  “You like movies, huh?” The rabbit turned to look at him, and then returned to the screen.  “You really are a strange thing, Rabbit.”

According to the time on the clock the soap opera was due to end any second, so Hux allowed the rabbit to have his way and left the movie running.  It was strange how the rabbit had been able to find the channel change button and only that one, but Hux chalked it up to nothing more than an coincidence.  It wasn’t as if the rabbit could read the remote and had purposely changed it, after all.

He was a rabbit.  Rabbits can’t read.

The movie playing was one of the original Star Wars movies, and Hux smiled to himself.  He had fond memories of pretending to be a Jedi with a boy from his neighbourhood in the years before he was shipped off to the academy.  It was one of the few childhood memories he had that was happy, and involved him doing things more typical of a child. Most of his life had been studying and doing whatever his father had requested of him, so it made those afternoons of swinging around tree branches like they were lightsabers even more precious to him.

When Darth Vader made his entrance on screen to choke an Empire officer and talk of a disturbing lack of faith, the rabbit sat next to Hux was so excited that he began to bounce in his seat.

“Trust you to like the Dark Side,” Hux smiled.

***

“How is the rabbit doing?”

It was 8pm on a Saturday evening, and Hux was sat on the sofa in his living room with an open bottle of wine, a season of Gossip Girl lined up on his Netflix, and Phasma barking down the phone at him.  She had never quite managed the art of speaking quietly and softly, and that didn’t change just because she was on the phone.

“He seems to be recovering nicely,” Hux answered.

The rabbit in question was dozing in Hux’s lap, his leg occasionally twitching as he dreamed about whatever rabbits dreamed about.  Was it open fields? An never ending supply of Harrods carrots? An all bunny version of Star Wars? Hux shook his head free of such thoughts with a smile and turned his attention back to Phasma.

“...every vet surgery and animal rescue in the area, and nobody has enquired about a lost rabbit yet.  I’m sure we’ll get him back to his owner, though.”

“I hope so,” Hux lied.

“Have you had any problems with him?”

“He’s a picky eater,” Hux began to explain.  “Turned his nose up at the pellets and hay and will only eat vegetables.  I think his original family spoiled him a little.”

Hux heard Phasma laugh down the phone.  “Something you’re no doubt carrying on.”

“I just want him to get better,” Hux replied.  “I was a little worried about him because he’s mainly just slept and sat around, but he was very energetic last night.”

“Was there any reason for that?” Phasma asked, curiosity lacing her voice.

“He found the remote control, changed the channel to a Star Wars movie and was practically doing back flips whenever Darth Vader came on screen.”  

“He changed the channel?” 

“He’s a strange rabbit,” Hux said, petting the rabbit’s back as he continued to sleep, “it felt like he was glaring at me when I offered him the rabbit pellets and hay.”

Phasma was silent for a few moments before speaking.  “I think you need more friends, Hux. Human friends.”

When Hux spoke, his voice was coloured with a touch of ice he usually reserved for only his more frustrating customers.  “What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that it’s 8pm on a Saturday night, and you’re at home talking about a judgemental rabbit with a Darth Vader fixation as if he’s capable of having either.  He’s a rabbit, Hux. You need to get out there and interact with more humans.”

“I’m not the only one on the phone at 8pm on a Saturday night talking about rabbits,” he pointed out.

“No, but the difference is I’m going to hang up in five minutes and get ready for a night on the town.  When you hang up, you’re just going to drink alone and work your way through your Netflix list.”

Hux didn’t answer.  Instead he sneered down the phone and hoped that Phasma could hear it.

“How long has it been since Dopheld broke it off, Hux?” Phasma asked, her voice dropping to an uncharacteristically gentle tone.  “A year? Eighteen months?”

It had been seventeen months and five days, not that Hux was counting.  Although time had given Hux the perspective he needed to realise that the break up had been the best decision for everyone involved, it still hurt to think about what had happened.  Dopheld Mitaka had been another employee at the toy store, and Hux had broken his own personal code of conduct by starting a relationship with him. Dopheld had such a gentle soul and had openly worshipped Hux since the day they had first met, so Hux had ignored the warning signs and accepted Dopheld’s stuttered and nervous request for a date.

Things had been fine, to begin with.  Dopheld had accepted Hux’s little idiosyncrasies, his aloofness and inability to express any emotions other than disdain or mild tolerance… until he hadn’t.  Hux had been angry at the time when Dopheld had likened him to a block of ice that had been painted red at the edges, but time and distance had dissolved Hux’s anger until all that was left was the knowledge that Dopheld had been right.

Hux had showed more emotion and care over the last couple of days for the rabbit currently dozing in his lap than he had towards Dopheld in the almost two years they’d dated.

“I’m worried about you, Hux,” Phasma continued.  “All you do is work and I know you’re not happy at the toy store either.”

“I like my job.”  In essence, that was the truth.  Hux did generally find children more agreeable than their parents and enjoyed seeing a young face light up when they held the toy of their dreams, but he didn’t particularly enjoy working in Peavey’s toy store.

When he’d first escaped the clutches of his father and the military life that Major General Brendol Hux had tried to push on him and started his business degree, Hux had had dreams of opening his own toy store.  One store would then turn into two, which would become a chain, and Hux would spend his days making children across the country happy. Somewhere along the way Hux would meet the man of his dreams and they’d find a house somewhere, a fixer-upper that they could work together on making a home.  Maybe there’d even be room for a few pets, too.

Now, here Hux was at 34 years old running a toy store for an owner that didn’t appreciate him, while nursing a glass of red on his own on a Saturday evening.  There was no chain of toy stores on the horizon, no ideal man and no dream home, just stress headaches, and the stench of loneliness.

“Look Hux, my taxi will be here soon so I have to go,” Phasma said apologetically, “but promise me that you’ll at least try?  There’s that singles night at Lloyds bar every Friday, we’ll go next week, yeah?”

Hux reluctantly agreed and wished Phasma a good night before hanging up the phone.  She was right, he knew, but he also knew how hard it was to dig yourself out of a hole once you’d made it your home.

He looked down at the rabbit that was still in his lap.  “Being human is hard work, Rabbit. Be glad that you aren’t one.”

The rabbit’s nose twitched, but he continued to doze.

**

The next few days passed quickly.  Business at the toy store was brisk but not overwhelmingly busy, and the customers were demanding but not to the point of frustration.  Each evening when Hux arrived home the rabbit would be waiting for him, his nose twitching in happiness as they both settled down to eat their dinners while the TV blared in the background.

Hux hadn’t thought it would be possible for a rabbit to have definitive opinions about TV shows, but this rabbit seemed to.  He hated soap operas, the news or sports, but loved action movies and would headbutt Hux’s thigh until his aimless channel hopping stopped on something that met the rabbit’s seal of approval.

Hux found that having an animal in the flat with him, even if it was only temporary, lifted his spirits.  Although he’d never been allowed a pet as a boy, his grandmother on his mother’s side had kept pet cats, and he’d always looked forward to visits to her house because it had meant he could play with them.  It hadn’t been until he was older that he had realised that the care his mother took to remove the cat hair from his trousers was to placate his animal hating father.

Thoughts of his grandmother and her pets reminded Hux that he hadn’t written to her in a couple of weeks.  Her best days were behind her now and she lived in a care home, but Hux tried to visit when he could and wrote letters when he couldn’t.

“I’m going to write a letter,” Hux said, ignoring the explosions ringing out from the TV screen.  “Do you want to help or do you want to spend the rest of the night with Jason Statham?”

The rabbit jumped on the remote that was lying next to Hux and managed to somehow switch the TV off.

Hux blinked.  “Right. Let’s get writing, shall we?”

He picked up the rabbit and took it into his spare bedroom, which had originally been designated as a guest room, but when Hux realized that he had no friends other than Phasma and would therefore never have any guests, he’d added a desk and called it his study instead.  He placed the rabbit on the desk and pulled out a few sheets of expensive writing paper from the drawers underneath. He picked up a couple of pens, too.

“Which do you think, Rabbit?  A normal ballpoint pen or shall I use the fountain pen and risk ink blotting?”

The rabbit looked between pens that Hux was holding in his two hands, and butted his head against the hand holding the fountain pen.  

“The fountain pen it is then,” Hux agreed.  “My grandmother loves animals too, I should tell her about you.”

The rabbit seemed happy to hear that, and shuffled around on the desk so that he had a better view of Hux’s paper.  Hux knew that his grandmother would love to hear about the rabbit, but he didn’t exactly know what to tell her. He put pen to paper, switched his brain off and let the words flow.

_“Hi Gran,_  
_I’m looking after this rabbit that I found bleeding in the unseasonal snow of last week.  He loves action movies, and hogs the remote control more than my ex-boyfriend did. He only eats the best vegetables from Harrods, and sneers at me worse than father whenever I try to feed him anything from the local market.  I don’t know his name, but he’s the best company I’ve had in months. How’s the nursing home?_  
_Love,_  
_Armitage.”_

He read over what he had wrote and laughed at himself.  The letter was ridiculous in its honesty, and Hux knew he could never send it.  It read like a modern day Peter Rabbit story, not a letter from a 34 year old professional to his beloved grandmother.  Hux put his hand on the paper and began to scrunch it into a ball but was stopped by the rabbit’s front paws pressing onto the edge of the paper.

“If you could read, you’d understand why I’m throwing this away,” Hux said.

The rabbit stared at him and tried to knock his hand away.  Hux humoured the rabbit, something he’d been doing frequently, and removed his hand.  The rabbit looked over the paper, his brown eyes seeming to move over the paper in a way that almost looked like he was reading it.  When the rabbit was finished, he turned away from the paper and turned his attention to the fountain pen that lay to Hux’s right.

“Don’t touch that,” Hux said, “you might get ink all over your fur.”

The rabbit ignored him and began rolling the pen along the table with his front paws.  But no, that wasn’t entirely correct. If Hux didn’t know better, he’d swear that the rabbit was trying to pick up the pen.  He had his paws on either side of the pen and was trying to squeeze it between them, but the lack of thumbs or any kind of leverage was making the rabbit’s task impossible.

“You want to write something?” Hux asked incredulously.  The rabbit looked at him, and nodded his head.

Hux felt like he was going crazy.

Hux found a cheaper piece of paper in one of the desk drawers and placed it on the table.  He then picked up the fountain pen and held it out to the rabbit, his mouth dropping open in shock when the rabbit cautiously gripped it between his front paws and then tilted his head to the side so that the end of the pen would fit into his mouth, giving the rabbit more leverage.

Hux guided the pen to the paper and held the paper in place.  “Well, if you draw something good maybe I can sell it on Etsy as a rabbit original.”

The rabbit’s movements were slow and shaky, but it wasn’t long before some sort of pattern began to take shape on the paper.  The rabbit moved the pen across the paper for what felt like an eternity before he was finished, his paws letting go of the fountain pen and allowing it to roll off the desk and bounce onto the carpet.

Hux paid no attention to the pen, because before him, the rabbit had written something.  He had expected random, indecipherable lines, but when he looked closely, it appeared to be uneven lettering.  

“K-Y-L-O,” Hux read.  “Ky-lo? Kylo?”

Maybe it had been too much to expect the rabbit’s random letters to be anything of consequence.  Maybe they were just random lines after all, Hux thought. The fact that they resembled letters was pure coincidence.

The rabbit seemed to note Hux’s confusion and pulled over Hux’s letter again.  Hux watched as the rabbit repeatedly tapped his nose over the same part of the letter.  A few days ago Hux would have dismissed the rabbit’s actions, but there’d been too many coincidences around the rabbit for him to do so now.  He looked at what the rabbit was gesturing to.

The rabbit was pointing to the part of the letter where Hux wrote about not knowing the rabbit’s name.

Hux opened his mouth to speak, but then shut it again.  He lifted his right hand, as if he was going to gesture at the rabbit, and then put it back down again.  Maybe Phasma was right, he really did need to get out of the house and speak to more human beings if he was beginning to entertain the idea that the rabbit had read his letter to his grandmother, and then written his name for Hux.

When Hux looked at the rabbit next, he was sitting on Hux’s letter and was holding the paper he’d written on in his mouth.  Hux closed his eyes for a couple of seconds, and gave into the madness. “Your name is Kylo?”

The rabbit, Kylo, Hux amended in his brain, bounced and nodded his head.

Kylo then jumped off the desk, the paper still in his mouth, and ran out of the study before Hux had chance to react.  By the time Hux had managed to leap out of his chair, he was just in time to see Kylo’s fluffy white tail disappear into his bedroom.  He found Kylo curled up on the empty side of his bed, the paper underneath him with the rabbit’s shaky writing clear to see, as if it was a name plate and Kylo was claiming his designated seat.

“Get down from there,” Hux said, “that’s a human bed, not a rabbit one.”

Kylo lifted his head from where it lay on his paws, stared at Hux, and then settled back down again, instantly falling asleep.

Hux sighed and pinched his nose.  He could feel a migraine coming on.  He knew that he could easily pick up Kylo and place him back into his own drawer bed, but he didn’t have the heart to move the sleeping animal.  After the craziness of the evening, of Kylo seemingly turning off the TV, reading Hux’s letter and then writing his own name, Hux wanted nothing more than to ignore the rabbit and sleep for a week.  Hux was sure that in the morning, he’d discover that everything had just been a fever dream.

Rabbits don’t read, rabbits don’t write, and they don’t have names like Kylo, he told himself.

He took one last look at the rabbit.  “Fine, stay there. But don’t complain if I roll over and crush you in my sleep.”

Hux completed his customary evening routine, the letter to his grandmother long forgotten, and climbed into bed while doing his best to ignore the pile of black fur dozing next to him.

**

Things were no different in the morning.  The rabbit was still there, sleeping on the empty side of the bed on a piece of paper that said ‘KYLO’ in shaky lettering.  Hux stared at Kylo for a few seconds before sighing and dragging himself out of bed so that he could get ready for the day ahead.  He resolved to speak to Phasma about the rabbit’s behaviour. Maybe some of them were known for their artist streaks, and their ability to write the alphabet…

Or maybe he’d keep this bit of Kylo’s behaviour to himself, just in case Phasma decided to stage an intervention and brought her gym buddies around just so Hux would have human contact.

By the time Hux had showered and was back in his bedroom dressed only in his boxers, an undershirt, socks and matching garters, Kylo was awake and watching him.  It was to be an important day for Hux, as some visitors from a toy company were due to come to the store, and Peavey had high hopes that a deal could be struck to gain exclusivity over a new range of toys.  As Peavey had the communication skills of a wet blanket, and Hux, despite his dislike of adults, could turn on the professionalism and charm anyone, such negotiations fell to him.

Hux believed that professional charm began with feeling like you owned the room and the world it was in, and for him that meant dressing the part.  The majority of his wardrobe was filled with made to measure suits, as he found that off the rack purchases were either too short in the leg, or too wide in the waist.  His tall, yet slim frame was rarely catered for without paying extra, but it was a cost that he felt was worth it. He flicked past his regular daily suits and pulled out the two special suits he kept in the corner of the wardrobe.

These two were made by Savile Row’s finest tailors and cost more than he would ever admit to paying.  They were his armour, his confidence and his victory. With these suits, there was nobody that would try to cut him a bad deal.  The question was, did he wear the black, or the navy blue?

“Which do you think, Kylo?” Hux turned to the rabbit.  “Black or blue?”

Kylo cocked his head to the side and his nose twitched.  He looked between the two suits, looked at Hux for a few seconds, and then promptly fell asleep again.

“Ah, not a suit man, I see,” Hux said.  Even if Kylo didn’t have an opinion, he could still help, Hux thought.

He chose the black, because it reminded him of Kylo’s fur.

**

When Hux came home that evening, he had a spring in his step that had long been missing.  He was in that good of a mood, that he didn’t even care that the guy in the flat above him had stolen his designated car parking space again.  He’d left Kylo in the living room that morning with the remote control, trusting that any rabbit that could write his name and work a remote control would be able to restrain from chewing the carpet.

His faith in Kylo was rewarded, as when he walked into the living room the rabbit was sat quietly on the sofa, seemingly watching a music channel.

“How was your day, Kylo?” Hux asked, picking up the rabbit.  Kylo twitched, but allowed Hux to cradle him in his arms. “My day was fantastic.”

Hux was so happy, he didn’t even notice that he was swaying to the music blaring from the TV.  “I had a really important meeting today with some reps from a toy company and I not only managed to cut a deal with them, but I cut a better deal than even Peavey imagined we’d be able to get.”

And hadn’t that both pleased and pissed off Peavey in equal measures?  It must be hard, Hux thought, to know that someone thirty years younger than you could be better at your job in every way and was single handedly keeping your shop running. 

“Maybe one day I’ll get that toy store of my own,” Hux smiled.  “I’ve always wanted one. Every toy store needs a mascot, so maybe I’ll have a big, black rabbit like you, Kylo, as the mascot of Hux’s Toy Store.  There’ll be a store in every major city in the country, and thousands of kids will have little Kylo toys.”

That day was still far in the future, Hux knew.  Until then, all of Hux’s hard work and skills were only serving to line Peavey’s pockets.  But, Hux didn’t want to think about that right now. He was going to celebrate his success with a fine bottle of whiskey, the Chinese takeout he’d picked up on his way home, and by dancing around his living room with his rabbit.

Well, maybe not that last one.  Hux put Kylo down onto the sofa and muttered an apology when the rabbit immediately turned the music off.  

Hux settled down to eat his takeout, having neatly put away his power suit and replaced it with a soft, black robe.  He ate in front of the TV, chopsticks in one hand and phone in the other as he messaged Phasma to confirm arrangements for their night out at singles night the next evening.  He was in such a good mood that he was even willing to cooperate with Phasma’s diabolical plans.

“Maybe I’ll even find a boyfriend tomorrow,” Hux said to Kylo.  

Kylo snorted.

Hux had cleaned up and was about to settle down with a glass of whiskey and a Kylo approved movie, when his phone rang.  If Hux hadn’t have been in such a good mood he would have checked who was calling before he answered it. However, because he was still flying high from his successes that day, he answered the phone with a bright greeting and then felt his mood plummet when he heard the crisp tones of the person on the other end of the phone.

“Hello, Father.  It’s good to hear from you.”

As the call progressed and Hux’s voice became colder and quieter, his responses to his father’s questions moving from being full sentences to a stilted “yes, sir,” Kylo came closer and closer.  By the time Hux signed off the call with a goodbye and a promise to visit at Christmas, a promise Hux had no intention of keeping, Kylo’s front paws were lightly kneading at the skin of Hux’s right hand.

No matter how far Hux felt that he had come in life, and no matter what he had achieved, there was nobody that had the ability to reduce it all to nothing like his father did.  All of the triumphs of the day, of obtaining an exclusive license for less than the market rate from a company that could have easily gone to a bigger store, had been wiped out by a few condescending words from his father.

“Do you know what it feels like to be the family disappointment?” Hux asked Kylo.  He knew that Kylo couldn’t answer, but just knowing that the rabbit was, in his own way, listening made Hux feel better.  “All I’ve ever wanted was to be loved for being myself.”

This time, however, it hadn’t just been his father’s disapproval of Hux’s career progression, but also his disapproval of Hux’s life in general.  Oh, his father had taken great delight in telling Hux all about the lavish weddings and baby showers of his various cousins, and his former classmates at the academy.  

Hux knew that even if the impossible happened and he did meet someone at the singles night tomorrow with Phasma, how many people would come to his wedding?  He wasn’t even certain that his own father would make the time, let alone the other members of his family or the poor excuses for acquaintances he’d made over the years.

“If I were to get married,” Hux said, “I think it’d just be you and Phasma on my side of the wedding party.”

Kylo nudged Hux’s hand with his head and managed to worm his way under Hux’s palm until Hux’s hand rested on top of his head.  The scar was really healing nicely now, and Hux scratched between Kylo’s ears.

“Thank you, Kylo.  You’re a great comfort.”

Kylo preened under the attention.

“I think you’ve quickly become my best friend,” Hux said, before adding, “after Phasma, that is.  She wins due to seniority and being human. Sorry about that.”

The rabbit seemed happy with that and nudged Hux’s hand again.  Dealing with his father always made Hux feel mentally exhausted, and any happiness or pride he’d been feeling before the phone call had drained away to be replaced by a tiredness and emptiness that Hux knew he wouldn’t be able to shake.

“I’m sorry Kylo, I know that we usually watch a movie together but I’m not really in the mood.  Let’s just go to bed and hope things seem better in the morning, huh?”

There was no argument from Kylo so Hux picked him up and carried him to the bedroom, placing him back onto the spare side of he bed, and onto the piece of paper he’d written on the night before.  Despite the ache in his heart, Hux fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow and he slept soundly through the night, not even feeling the mattress dip under a sudden increase of weight.

**

Hux woke the next morning in a state of dull confusion.  His head felt foggy and clouded, and he quickly recognised the feeling of his head being stuffed with cotton wool as being an emotional hangover from the phone call he’d received the night before.  He opened his eyes to darkness, and saw he’d woken up thirty minutes before his alarm was due to ring. That was good, he thought, it’d give him thirty minutes to lie in bed and clear his mind before he had to face the day.

Hux closed his eyes again and rolled over so that he faced the centre of the bed.  Eighteen months ago, Dolpheld would have been lying there, and with his eyes closed Hux could almost fool himself into thinking that he was still there.  He could practically feel a dip in the bed and the heat of another body lying next to him.

But that was impossible.  The other side of the bed had been cold and lonely since Mitaka had left, and not even a rabbit like Kylo could warm a bed like another human could.

Hux allowed his mind to drift as he relaxed into his pillow, forcibly pulling his mind away whenever it threatened to go towards thoughts his father.  Instead, he tried to concentrate on the successes of yesterday, and attempted to muster some enthusiasm for the night out he had arranged with Phasma. He’d felt so hopeful about that yesterday, and he grasped onto the lingering strands of enthusiasm with both hands and let that light spread through his mind.

Surprisingly, he felt better already and opened his eyes again before his alarm rang, ready to face the day with a resolve that he hadn’t expected to feel.

Hux screamed, loudly, when he opened his eyes to the face of a stranger sleeping mere inches away from him.

In his surprise, terror and desperate need to get as far away from the man as possible, Hux fell out of bed in an undignified scramble of limbs and bed linen.  Once he’d managed to extract himself from the duvet that had wrapped around his legs, he grabbed the cricket bat that he kept beside the bed and pointed it at the unknown man that was stretched out on the side of the bed that had once been Dolpheld’s.

The man was sitting up now and rapidly blinking his bleary eyes as he came back to full consciousness, having no doubt been woken up by Hux’s scream.  The man had shaggy dark hair, deep brown eyes, broad shoulders and was, for some inexplicable reason, completely naked.

“I don’t have anything worth stealing,” Hux blurted out, shaking the cricket bat in what he hoped was a menacing way.

The man seemed to jump in surprise at the sound of Hux’s voice, and seemed even more surprised when he turned his head to look at him.  “I’m not going to steal anything… wait… what?”

The man lifted his right hand to his throat, his long fingers rubbing the skin of his elegant neck, before he lifted his hands in front of his eyes.  He stared at them in wonder, as if he’d never seen his own hands before.

He turned back to Hux, a broad smile spreading across his face.  “You did it, Hux! You broke the curse!”

When the man moved to approach Hux, Hux angrily jabbed the cricket bat in his direction.  “I didn’t do anything! Who are you, and how do you know my name?”

The man stared at the cricket bat and sensibly stopped moving.  “Look, I know this is going to sound crazy…”

“More crazy than a burglar breaking into my house and then taking a nap next to me naked?”

The man’s cheeks flushed red as he noticed his nudity for the first time.  He slowly climbed off the bed on the opposite side to Hux and grabbed a pillow to cover his crotch.  Hux was glad that he did because the man’s body was, frankly, highly distracting. He pulled his eyes away from the man’s thick chest and glared at his still red face, his fingers gripping onto the cricket bat even tighter.

“I’m not a burglar,” the man said, “I’m Kylo.”

“I don’t know anyone named Kylo,” Hux answered without thinking.

“Right, this is going to be hard to explain,” the man muttered to himself.  

“Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t call the police, right now,” Hux said.  

“Well, about eight hours ago I was a rabbit,” the man replied, bending down to pick up the piece of paper with ‘KYLO’ written on it in shaky writing.  “I wrote this, a couple of nights ago. See? Kylo.”

Hux pinched himself to see if he was still dreaming.  Then he pinched himself a second time, just to make sure.  “I’m sorry, I must have misheard you because I think I heard you say that you used to be a rabbit.”

“That’s what I said.  It’s a really long story,” the man said with a wave of his hand, “but yes, you’ve been looking after me for the last week.  Thanks for that, by the way.” The man blushed again.

Hux felt like hitting himself over the head with his cricket bat in the hope that things would begin to make more sense.  This man was claiming to be Kylo the rabbit. This tall, broad man with thick black hair, brown eyes and a scar that ran across his face in the exact same place as Kylo…. That was all just a coincidence, right?  Just because the rabbit had also had black fur, brown eyes and a scar running across his face didn’t mean the man was telling the truth.

“Rabbits don’t just become human,” Hux said with a scowl.  “Maybe you hit your head a little too hard.”

“There’s nothing wrong with…” the man’s voice trailed off as he lifted his hand to his face, his fingers tracing the scar that started on his forehead and ran down to his chest.  “I still have the scar,” he whispered, as if he was surprised it was there.

Hux waved his cricket bat in the man’s direction.  “You’ll have another one soon if you come any closer.”

“I’m not going to hurt you,” the man claimed as he raised his hands in a show of surrender.  “You’ve been good to me this last week.”

“I was good to a rabbit,” Hux sighed, disbelief clear in his voice, “not to you.”

“That was me!” The man exclaimed.

Hux shook his head and picked up his mobile phone.  “I’m calling the police.”

“Wait!”  When the man spoke next, it was in a rush of words that Hux struggled to keep up with.  “You found me, bleeding in the snow a week ago. Your friend Phasma came and patched me up, and left those disgusting pellet things for me to eat.  We watched Star Wars together. You wrote a letter for your grandmother. I wrote my name,” he waved the paper around again, “you told me about the chain of pet stores you wanted, and you got upset after your father called and tore you down.  You shouldn’t listen to him, by the way. I think you’re doing great.”

That was the story of Hux’s week with Kylo the rabbit, but that didn’t prove anything either.  “Maybe you’ve been stalking me all week, and that’s why you know that.”

“Stalked you?  I’d needed to have bugged the apartment to have heard all of that,” the man said, his deep American accent rising in pitch as his agitation began to show.

The man calling himself Kylo sighed to calm himself down, but then the sigh turned into a yawn and he stretched, his shoulders and chest flexing in a way that distracted Hux yet again.  “Can you please put some clothes on?” Hux asked.

“I don’t have any clothes,” the man said.  “I’ve been covered in fur for the last week and didn’t need any.”

“Stand in the corner,” Hux ordered, using his cricket bat to point to where he wanted the man to go.  After the man complied, Hux cautiously edged his way to his wardrobe.

“Fine,” the man agreed.  “Can you put that baseball bat down?”

“Firstly, it’s a cricket bat,” Hux corrected as he opened the wardrobe door and grabbed some workout clothes that Phasma had gifted him a few months before.  “Secondly, put these on.”

Hux threw the clothes directly at the man but he fumbled the catch.  He didn’t have much grace, Hux noticed, it was as if he wasn’t entirely in control of his limbs.  While the man dressed, Hux tried to take stock of the situation. He had a strange naked man in his bedroom that was claiming to be Kylo the rabbit, and he had a uncanny knowledge of everything that had happened that past week with Kylo.  The man had made no efforts to attack Hux, and seemed woefully unequipped for a burglar.

Either the man was the world’s worst burglar who’d decided to take a naked nap halfway through, or maybe, he was somehow telling the truth.  Hux’s brain was telling him to call the police and let them deal with his naked intruder, but his heart and his intuition, two things he’d done his best to try and ignore his entire life, were telling him that this man truly was Kylo.

It would make some of Kylo the rabbit’s oddest behaviour make sense.  He could read and write, because he was really human. He had been able to understand Hux and read his moods and emotions, because he was a human trapped in a rabbit’s body.

“Hypothetically speaking,” Hux began, “how does one get turned into a rabbit in the first place?”  Maybe Hux wasn’t as over his emotional hangover as he thought he was, if he was entertaining the man’s crazy story.

“You get on the wrong side of a powerful dark wizard,” the man answered.  He was now fully dressed. “I wouldn’t recommend that.”

“No, it doesn’t seem like the best idea,” Hux agreed.  “How do you then become human again?”

The man smiled.  Hux once again felt like hitting himself with his cricket bat because that smile was contagious, and Hux had always been a sucker for a pretty smile.  “You find someone kind enough to take you in, and call you their friend. That’s what the curse was - to remain a rabbit until I found a friend.”

Hux frowned.  “That’s oddly specific.”

The man’s eyes grew impossibly sad.  Hux had taught himself over the years to keep his own emotions and feelings locked up inside, but it seemed that this man wore all of his on his pretty face.  “I never had many friends even when human,” the man admitted, “that’s how Snoke found me in the first place. He became the friend and support system that I never felt that I had, and then turned on me when I disappointed him too many times.”

Hux thought back to his own desperately lonely childhood, and to the first years of his life as an adult before he met Phasma, and wondered if he would have been taken in by someone in the same way this man had said he had been.  Maybe he would have been. He’d latched onto Phasma’s offer of friendship as tightly as he could as soon as it had been offered, and he considered himself lucky that, occasional crazy scheme aside, she only had his best interests at heart.  It all could have worked out very differently, however, if Phasma hadn’t have been the good person she was.

Hux sighed and lowered his cricket bat.  He still didn’t know what to believe, but he considered himself a good enough judge of character to know that the man posed no danger to him.

“You’re going to be late for work,” the man said softly, gesturing to Hux’s alarm clock that was due to sound at any second.  “And I should go, my family are probably worried about me.”

“You have family in London?” Hux asked.  He’d noticed the unmistakable American accent early in the conversation.

“My cousin lives here with her husband,” the man explained.  “I don’t know if my parents are here looking for me or not.”

They both fell silent for a few moments until Hux’s alarm cut through the thick atmosphere and startled Hux out of his thoughts.  He turned the alarm off and threw his duvet back onto the bed, leaving himself shivering in his silk pajamas. 

“I’ll go,” the man said.  “I’m sorry to have frightened you this morning, if I’d have known that I’d wake up as myself this morning I would have slept in my drawer.”

“I don’t think you’d fit in it anymore,” Hux replied.

The man laughed.  “Probably not. Thank you, again, for rescuing me and looking after me this past week.  I hope you have a good night out with Phasma tonight, and find that boyfriend you wanted.”

Hux couldn’t answer, and just nodded in agreement.  He found that he had nothing else to say, and the idea of this man, this stranger, leaving his flat and allowing the rest of the day to progress as normal was too appealing to Hux at that moment.  Hux had always had a habit of running away from difficult situations and throwing himself into the familiar, and at that moment nothing appealed to him more than another boring and routine day at work.

“I know where the front door is, so I’ll see myself out.  Have a good day at work.”

Hux watched the man leave the bedroom, and a few seconds later he heard his front door open and shut.  He stood in his bedroom without moving for what felt like ages, until he suddenly realized that the man had left his flat barefooted.  It was this simple realisation that made Hux begin to laugh, as the stresses of the previous evening and that morning finally caught up with him.  He allowed himself a few moments to laugh it out and regain his composure, before he hurriedly got ready for the day ahead. Not even the appearance of a naked stranger in his bed was going to make Armitage Hux late for work.

Before he left for another day at the toy store, he made one thorough tour of his flat, just in case Kylo the rabbit was hiding somewhere, but no sign of the rabbit was to be found.  Hux decided to ignore what that might mean, and left for work, firmly pushing everything that had happened that morning out of his brain.

**

When Hux arrived home that evening he paused on his doorstep with his key in the lock but not yet turned, and gave himself a few seconds to prepare so that he wouldn’t be disappointed when he came home to a lonely, rabbit-free flat again.  His forehead rested against the smooth, recently varnished wood of his front door and he counted to twenty while taking in deep breaths, just as a therapist had once told him to do several years back. When he reached twenty he stood up straight, squared his shoulders and turned the key in the lock.

Kylo’s drawer was still in the kitchen and Hux sighed as he picked it up and returned it to the bottom of his wardrobe, the towels inside being haphazardly thrown into his laundry basket along the way.  Hux straightened out his duvet from the pile he’d left it in that morning, and then paused, his hands lying flat on the side that had covered the usually empty side of the bed. He could smell something new on it, an earthy, spicy and by no means unattractive scent that could only have belonged to the strange man that had turned Hux’s morning into such terrifying chaos.

Hux quickly stripped the cover off the duvet, tearing some of the linen in the process.  He didn’t want to be reminded of anything that had happened that morning.

With the now ruined duvet cover safely disposed of in the bin and the matching pillow cases thrown into the laundry hamper, Hux returned to the kitchen and began to make himself some dinner.  His eyes roamed sadly over the stockpile of expensive vegetables he’d collected over the last week as his fingers itched to chop them up and prepare them for Kylo. Instead, he decided to get out of the kitchen as quickly as possible and settled for microwaving a frozen pizza that had been in his freezer for four months.

He sat down with the pizza in the living room and switched the television on.  It came onto the last channel viewed, which was currently showing one of the soap operas that Kylo hated so much.  But this time, there was no furry head butting his thigh to get him to change the channel, and no oddly coordinated rabbit’s paw to change the channel either.  The programme continued, but none of the drama registered with Hux.

The phone call from his father yesterday, the incident with the strange man that morning, a horrible day at work, and now a lonely and empty apartment…. Hux closed his eyes, sank back into his sofa and wondered how everything had gone so wrong, so quickly.

A chime from his mobile phone interrupted Hux’s musings, and he saw that he had a message from Phasma confirming the details of their night out that evening.  Hux replied with a vague message about feeling too sick to make it and sent his apologies, promising to make it up to her next week. 

After finishing his pizza, drinking three glasses of wine and spending more time staring at the ceiling than was probably healthy, Hux went to bed.  As he put a new cover on the duvet, he felt something crinkle underneath his bare toes. It was Kylo’s paper, the one he’d written his name on. Hux smoothed it out with a sad smile and placed it back onto the bed in the same place it had been for the last few nights and then lay down.  The emotional upheaval of the last couple of days had left Hux exhausted, and he soon slipped into a restless sleep.

He dreamed of opening his own toy store.  It was a beautiful, meticulously planned store in central London full of well coordinated bright colours and laughter ringing from every corner.  The shelves were full of toys of all kinds, from traditional to the most technologically advanced, but the most popular line, the one that every child wanted, was the line featuring the store’s mascot - a cute, black rabbit named Kylo.  Hux was there, watching all of the happy faces around him handing over handfuls of cash, and there was a dark figure standing next to him. In the dream, Hux couldn’t see the figure’s face, but he felt no fear towards the shadowed person, only contentment and comfort.

When Hux woke the next morning, with his hair in his eyes and in a pool of his own drool, the dream remained only in fragments that were quickly disappearing.  Hux groaned, rolled onto his back, and prepared himself for another day at Peavey’s toy store.

**

Hux was starting to think that he had been a terrible person in a previous life.  Maybe he had once been a super villain that had created a super-weapon and gleefully destroyed several planets with it, and he was paying for that crime in this life.  Saturdays at the toy store were always rough due to an increase in customers and a decrease in patience of those customers, but this Saturday had been particularly rough.

A boy had been sick on his shoes, a group of teenagers had stolen some action figures, there had been a fight over the last special edition Barbie doll on the shelves, and Peavey had locked himself in his office leaving Hux to deal with everything.

Due to Hux staying slightly later than normal in order to finish restocking the shelves that had been destroyed in the Barbie doll brawl, he’d unfortunately managed to hit the traffic jam that always arose on a late Saturday afternoon whenever the local football team played a home game.  He was usually able to escape before the mass exodus of 40,000 drunk football fans began, but not this week. Hux and his Toyota Yaris were not moving anywhere soon, so he switched the usually silent radio on and scanned through the channels in the hope of finding a travel report.

He didn’t find a travel report, but he did find a news report so he stuck with that in the hope that a travel report would follow and he’d be able to find a different route home.  Hux tuned out the news and concentrated on the slowly moving traffic ahead as the newscaster started talking about the latest political scandal. He found his mind wandering again, back to the events of the last couple of days that he’d so successfully blocked out while he was having to dodge uppercuts in the store earlier.

The news broadcast grabbed his attention again a few minutes later when he heard what he thought sounded like a familiar voice.  It was male, deep and American…. It sounded like the strange man from yesterday morning. His voice had been pretty distinctive, and it was something that Hux wouldn’t forget easily.  Hux quickly poked at the buttons on his steering wheel and turned the volume up.

_“'...like to thank the police for all of the support they gave my family during this ordeal.  Finally, and most importantly, I want to thank the man that found me in the snow, took me in, and helped me recover when I was in dire need of a friend.  He saved my life, and I can never repay that. Thank you.'_

_'That was a prepared statement from Ben Solo, the son of US senator Leia Organa-Solo that went missing here in London just over a week ago, but returned to his family yesterday.  A man, known only by the single name Snoke, has been arrested in connection with his disappearance. The Metropolitan police are still looking for information on this case, and have set up a helpline…'”_

Hux switched the radio off.  

He didn’t know how long he sat there, staring out of the windshield yet seeing nothing, but it was long enough for the cars behind him to start beeping their horns to get his attention and make him start driving again.  Hux put the car into gear and was glad to find that the traffic had eased slightly and he was able to keep moving, albeit a little slower than he would have liked. He was a conscientious driver, especially in traffic, so it was relatively easy for Hux to concentrate solely on the road ahead.

Finally, Hux reached his street but he stopped just before turning in and quickly ran into the newsagents on the corner.  The locally produced newspaper that was published every evening filled the stands and Hux grabbed one, paying quickly with exact change, before driving the last few yards to his flat.  He parked the car, turned off the engine, engaged the handbrake and opened the newspaper.

The latest adultery scandal of a famous politician dominated the front pages next to a story about a local school winning a national singing contest, but Hux found the story he wanted, tucked away on page four.  There was a report from the press conference Hux had heard on the radio, and sat in the middle of the photo, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else, was definitely the man that had been in Hux’s bedroom the previous day.  

He looked different with proper clothes on, Hux thought.

The man, Ben Solo, was flanked by another man and a woman that the caption underneath the photo stated were his cousin and her husband, and Hux quickly scanned the text of the report to find out what had happened.  Solo, 29, had left America five years prior after meeting a mysterious cult leader known only as Snoke. He’d joined Snoke and his other followers, collectively known as the Knights of Ren, in London and changed his name to Kylo Ren…

Kylo.

Like the rabbit.

Hux groaned and collapsed forward, banging his head off the steering wheel and flailing in surprise when the horn sounded.  

He continued reading the article, but there was nothing more than what Hux had heard on the radio.  Hux’s own part in the story was being played down, as Solo had stressed repeatedly that he’d been taken in by a good samaritan that had no connection, or knowledge of the case.  The police seemed more preoccupied with finally nabbing Snoke, who had been wanted on a string of other charges, to care about Hux. For that, at least, Hux was glad.

Hux threw the newspaper onto the passenger seat and left it there as he exited the car.  His mind was still so full of confusion after reading the article that he barely noticed the plain brown box that was sitting on his doorstep until he nearly stepped on it.  He managed to stop himself before he did, and then stared at the box as if it would be able to tell him why it was there.

It had been hand delivered.  The postman wouldn’t have left a box that size on his doorstep, and there was no address written on it.  All it said, in beautifully ornate handwriting that looked so impossibly perfect Hux wondered if it was printed, were four words.

_To Hux, with thanks._

Hux cautiously picked up the box, finding it to be lighter than he expected, and when he couldn’t hear any ticking, opened his door and took it inside.

He placed the box on the kitchen table and used a pair of scissors to slice through the tape that was holding the box closed.  His confusion only increased when he opened the box and saw a plastic bag with the logo of Harrods food hall stamped on it. He gingerly lifted the bag out and took a cautious peek inside.

Carrots.

A dozen or so it seemed at first glance.

Hux put the carrots down on the table.  There was a bubble of realisation starting to grow in his chest, but he pushed it down as he took another look inside the box.  The box was largely empty now, but he could see that there were a couple of pieces of paper at the bottom. He took a deep breath before gently lifting them out, taking more care than was necessary to make sure that they didn’t rip or become damaged in the process.

The first piece of paper was a handwritten letter.  It was good quality writing paper, and not unlike the stack of paper Hux had in his study and reserved for correspondence with his grandmother.  The letter was folded in half and Hux opened it slowly, his eyes widening at the same neat print that had adorned the box being spread out across this paper too.  The penmanship really was exquisite, Hux knew, but he forced himself to stop wasting time appreciating the handwriting, and to instead read the words.

It was short, but to the point.

_Dear Hux,  
I have so many things to say to you, but I don’t know how to say any of them.  This was so much easier when I was a rabbit. I’m sorry if I scared you yesterday morning.  I know this all seems crazy to you. To be honest, it seems crazy to me too and I lived through it.  Anyway, I appreciated the classy carrots so I thought I’d replace some. I hope that you get that toy store one day.  You deserve it. If you do, maybe I’ll drop by one day._

_Ben ‘Kylo’ Solo._

There was an address on the letter too, and Hux recognised the address as not being too far away from his flat.  He placed the letter down neatly, and picked up the other piece of paper that had been in the box.

It was a drawing.  Hux couldn’t stop his eyes from watering when he recognised what it was a drawing of.  Kylo had drawn him a picture of a toy store. There were happy children coming in and out of the store, all clutching plastic bags with the store’s logo emblazoned upon it.  The sign outside said ‘Hux’s Toy Store’ in a bold but classy font, and the front window was full of signs advertising the store’s latest deals. And there, in the corner of the window, was a big drawing of the store’s mascot, a cute and fluffy black rabbit.

It was perfect.  

Hux grabbed his car keys, the drawing and the letter and ran out the front door.

**

Hux’s flurry of action and adrenaline lasted as long as it took him to drive to the address on the letter, and died as soon as he was standing on the doorstep of a nice townhouse that appeared to match the address on the letter he grasped in his hand.  When Hux had seen Kylo’s interpretation of the toy store that only existed in Hux’s dreams, Hux had known what he had to do. Even the part of his brain that made him rethink things until he talked himself out of anything impulsive had been quiet, and Hux had driven the short distance with complete certainty that he was doing the right thing.

He hadn’t, however, stopped to consider what he would do when he arrived at his destination.

Hux shuffled nervously on his feet, took a deep breath and decided that for once in his life, he wasn’t going to overthink things.  He wasn’t going to consider what might happen when he knocked on that door, instead he was just going to blunder in and see what happened.  Phasma had always told him that he needed to live in the moment more, and that’s what he was going to do.

He knocked on the door, and counted under his breath while he waited for it to open.  It opened at eight, and Hux was greeted by a pretty young lady that he recognised from the photos in the paper.  This was the cousin, if he recalled correctly. 

She glared at Hux with such ferocity that he took a step back.  “No more interviews.”

Then she slammed the door in his face.

Hux blinked, and then banged on the door.  When there was no answer, he crouched down and opened the letterbox.  He’d come this far, there was no point going home now. “I’m not from the media,” Hux shouted through the letterbox, “but I need to speak to Kylo.”

It took a few seconds, but Hux finally heard a voice shout back at him.  “Why?”

“Because I’m the guy that found him in the snow.”

The door opened again, but this time, it was Kylo standing there.  Hux was suddenly aware that his position crouched on the doorstep put his face at crotch level, so he quickly stood up, his cheeks flushing.  “I wasn’t expecting you to open the door,” Hux explained.

Kylo looked amused, but quickly scrubbed the smile off his face for a more neutral expression.  “You’d better come inside, Hux.”

Kylo led Hux into the kitchen.  It was neatly organised, and on a different day Hux would have appreciated the simple colour scheme and sparkling clean cabinets, but he couldn’t take his eyes away from Kylo.  The man seemed broader than he remembered, and he was radiating nervous energy. Hux was glad that it wasn’t just himself that felt a little lost.

“I’m sorry about Rey,” Kylo said, “she’s ten years younger than me but thinks that she’s my mother.”

“That’s quite all right,” Hux replied.  

Kylo sighed.  “Why are you here, Hux?”

Hux lifted up the letter and drawing that he held tight in his hand.  “I wanted to thank you for the box.”

Kylo seemed surprised at Hux’s answer.  “You’re welcome. The least I could do was replace some of the carrots I ate.”

“I really don’t understand any of this,” Hux said honestly.  “You were a rabbit, and then you weren’t? How is that even possible?”

Kylo ran one of his hands through his hair, and it left Hux wondering if his hair was as soft as the fur of the rabbit had been.  He shook that thought out of his head and concentrated on what Kylo had to say.

“It was a magic spell,” Kylo replied, “one that only one person could do and thankfully he isn’t a problem anymore.”

“That Snoke guy, right?” Hux said, remembering the name from the news report.  Kylo winced at the sound of his name, and Hux smiled sadly in apology.

Kylo nodded his head.  “Yeah… I’m sorry you got caught up in all of this.”

Hux replied immediately, and surprised even himself with the force of conviction in his voice.  “I’m not sorry. Kylo the rabbit was a great comfort to me this past week.”

Kylo smiled, and Hux’s heart skipped a beat.  “I’m glad to hear that. I’m happy it was you that found me.”

Hux’s smiled matched Kylo’s.  “We had a good week, didn’t we?”

“We did,” Kylo agreed.  “I wouldn’t mind seeing you again, sometime.”

That surprised Hux.  He found that most people not named Phasma would never voluntarily spend any more time with him than they had to.  His cold demeanour and awkwardness around people, the lingering results of his harsh upbringing, usually drove everyone away.  This man that Hux was beginning to believe truly had been a rabbit for the past week, hadn’t seen any of that. He’d seen Hux’s rare soft and caring side, the side that took in injured animals and danced around the living room with them, and he’d seen Hux broken after a phone call from his father.  But Kylo had never seen the side of Hux that didn’t know how to speak to people, or the Hux that was selfish and needed hours alone in silence to destress. 

And what did he know of Kylo?  He knew about a rabbit that only ate expensive vegetables, watched action movies and had opinions on pens, but he knew little of the man stood in front of him.  Ben Solo was the son of a senator, had been taken in by a cult leader and had a cousin named Rey. Anyone that had read the morning paper knew that.

“I don’t even know you,” Hux said quietly.  

“You’ve seen me naked,” Kylo pointed out.

Hux blushed again, and his blush only increased when Kylo laughed at his obvious discomfort.  It wasn’t a mocking laugh, however, like Hux might have expected. It was a light laugh, and one that Hux found himself joining in with.

“Okay,” Kylo said after he’d finished laughing.  When Hux risked looking at him again, he was stood there with his right hand held out.  “Hello. I’m Ben Solo, but you can call me Kylo. Nice to meet you.”

Hux smiled again, and his smile only became wider when Kylo smiled back.  He took Kylo’s hand, and shook it firmly. “Armitage Hux. Nice to meet you, too.”

“Well, Armitage Hux,” Kylo continued, “why don’t we get to know each other over dinner tomorrow evening?”

Hux paused.  Kylo’s face was open and hopeful, and it pulled at Hux’s heart.  Here was an attractive, kind man wearing his heart on his sleeve and giving Hux a chance, and all Hux wanted to do was run away and hide.  He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t accept the branch of friendship that Kylo was offering him, because he knew that he’d only screw it up and push Kylo away, just like he’d pushed away Mitaka and everyone not named Phasma.

Hux couldn’t look at Kylo anymore.  His eyes fell to the floor, and he became aware of the paper he still gripped in his hands.  There was Kylo’s letter, the one with the address of the house he was standing in written on, and there was the drawing.

The perfect drawing of Hux’s dream toy store.  The toy store that not even Phasma could have described so well.

“Okay,” Hux said slowly, hardly believing his own decision.  “I’d like that.”

“Great!  I’ll find somewhere nice and quiet.”  Kylo’s smile could rival the sun, Hux thought.  

Hux took a deep breath and engaged his heart before his brain.  “You could always come to mine. We could watch a movie together, and I could serve you something a little better than a plate of chopped vegetables.”

“Sounds good to me,” Kylo agreed.

As they said their goodbyes and Hux greeted Rey properly, staggering back slightly when she threw herself at him in a full body hug to say thanks for looking after her cousin, Hux felt a contentment that he hadn’t felt since he’d had a rabbit sleeping on his lap.  There was still a simmering level of fear underneath it all as he still worried slightly that he’d drive Kylo away, but for once that fear was being drowned underneath hope he hadn’t known he could feel anymore.

Phasma would be proud of him.

**  
_Five years later_

It was finally the day that Hux had been working towards for so long.  Four solid months of daily long hours, and a lifetime of dreaming had led to today, and Hux felt a mixture of excitement and nerves running through his veins.  He straightened his cufflinks and tie for the twentieth time in the last fifteen minutes and allowed his eyes to sweep one last time over the pristine shelves that surrounded him.

In a short five minutes time, Hux’s Toy Store, his toy store, would open its doors for the first time.

As those five minutes reduced to four, and then to three, he felt the excitement ebb away and the nerves grow stronger.  Was all of the stock in the right places? Did they have enough change in the till? Were the staff adequately trained? Would anyone even come to the store…?

His panicked questions were cut off by the feel of a large hand slipping into his.

Hux turned his head and was greeted by the warm, smiling eyes of his business partner and soon to be husband.  “You’ve got this,” Kylo said. He looked devastatingly handsome in that suit, Hux thought. 

“No,” Hux shook his head.  He cut off Kylo’s reply with a press of his fingers to Kylo’s plush lips.  “We’ve got this.”

It had taken a combination of Hux’s life savings, Kylo’s trust fund, and a couple of bank loans to bankroll the opening of the store, and it had been Kylo’s art skills and Hux’s expert knowledge that had designed the store.  It may have been Hux’s dream, but it had taken them both to realise it. Hux would be forever grateful for that.

As the clock was about to strike 9am, Kylo placed a kiss on Hux’s hand before letting go.  “Time to get this show on the road,” Kylo whispered.

Hux nodded and took a few steps to his left, while Kylo took a few steps to his right.  They now stood either side of the big display of black rabbit plushies that dominated the centre of the store.  Hux scratched behind the ears of one of the rabbits as the clock struck 9am, and then gave the order to open the door.

Hux and Kylo greeted their first customers in unison.  “Welcome to Hux’s Toy Store.”

**Author's Note:**

> I was going to write this with Thomas McGregor instead, but as I've still yet to see Peter Rabbit, I didn't want to get his characterisation wrong.
> 
> Come and say hello at my [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/rosensilence) or [Tumblr](http://rosensilence.tumblr.com/)


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